The right thing to do is what makes us feel good, without breaking the law
If at the end of a decision you feel good, you have made the right decision for you. Doing what society views as the right thing might make you feel good, it might not. You might have your own views of right and wrong and feel amazing fighting for them. I would agree if you went to prison however or had a criminal record, that would make you feel rubbish because it’s like society is being mean/punishing you.
Comments (72)
It feels good to take heroin.
Sure thing, but I think you wouldn’t feel good when you’re life is screwed up, maybe that’s why it is illegal?
It feels good for a rapist to rape a woman.
It feels good to rip people off.
Quoting Maya
You might want to change the title of your thread.
:naughty:
The right thing to do is what is best for yourself as well as what is best for your pals. Or what is good for yourself and not harmful to others or better adds value to the lives of others.
This is moral relativism writ large, and for better or worse, it is us.
I might have worded the truism a little differently, but the gist is there.
Yes, thank you. I think there are no morals, it’s a personal view. Is that moral relativism?
That’s fine, as a personal view. We all have them.
I wonder, though, how you justify having no morals. It must depend on what you think morals are, such that the absence of them doesn’t diminish your humanity. Or morals don’t determine one’s humanity.
Hmmmm........dunno.
Remember also that laws come into and out of being to serve particular interests and can be interpreted and executed with bias.
What if you had to pay a gratuitous tax for every extra window you wanted to put in your house? Such laws likely have little to nothing to do with what is right or wrong in a moral sense.
I guess I think the most human thing you can do is stick to what’s true for you, what works for you.
Ahhh. So what would I do if money came into play? Well, I guess I would weigh the pros and cons. Would someone who has strong morals do this too? I don’t know. How would having morals and making a decision play out?
Why do you think that?
I would say all knowledge and morals are baseless. Not values I don’t think. Values are principles that help you decide what is right and wrong and how to behave. A principle is a basic idea or rule. Are values personal or held by society or both? What if I don’t have the values of my society because I think they are meaningless because there are so many different cultures in the world with different values?
Why would I be interested in what's "true for me"? How can I even make sense of that? The Donald Trump definition of truth: What is true is whatever works for me.
Moral skepticism?
Mmm! Yes. Moral skepticism. Cool. Which one are you?
I haven't decided.
How much time do you have left?? I mean no offence.
This isn't about me.
What isn’t? The forum? You mean the world? Would you be happy to finish undecided though? That sounds silly to me, all that thinking about a question for nothing. Or do you plan to decide someday or ‘die trying’ ?
I mean, I rather not discuss my personal views. If you must know, I happen to dislike philosophy and prefer to take a practical approach to life.
One can take it further and say that people who promote morals and morality do so because it makes them feel good.
In summary, doing what is best for yourself and others is in fact what is best for yourself and others. Well, the topic of OP is so huge that nothing intelligent can be said but in general, I think many opportunities are lost when you only serve yourself and no opportunities gained.
How do you define philosophy? What is it you dislike about it?
Does it matter about my personal beliefs about philosophy?
Here is how I would define philosophy: I say philosophy is what philosophers do. It's the ideas and arguments that thinkers who sit around in armchairs come up.
Philosophy isn't at all practical. You can't use philosophy in your ordinary life.
You dont think critical thinking or the rules of logic are philosophy then I take it?
Logic and critical thinking are skills. I never found it useful to look up rules of logic when arguing with someone.
So thats no? They arent under the purview of philosophy?
Im asking because if they were a part of philosophy then that would mean the claim philosophy is not at all practical is false as those things are clearly very practical. Have you considered that implication?
Doesn’t Socrates’ way of living refute this? Or Diogenes perhaps? What about Buddhism, or Hedonism?
Not so fast. There's a difference between being logical, and studying logic. The former is an ability: the latter, philosophy.
I am not so familiar with those schools of thought. Perhaps my mind can be changed. I also try to keep an open mind.
Then why join a philosophy forum?
To test my ideas? I don’t mind who it’s coming from. But it’s not like an authority figure that tells you to do things and doesn’t give any explanation why, or is open to debate. I make my own decisions.
I would agree with that, I think.
Sure, thats fine. Im asking you if you think those two things fall under “philosophy”. Like, if you were to study critical thinking or logic, would I be taking a philosophy class or something else? Its like if I asked you if geometry or calculus are under the purview of math....you wouldnt say “not so fast, using geometry isnt the same as studying geometry”, thats non-sequitor.
Do you think critical thinking and logic fall under the purview of philosophy?
You advocate for morality out of empathy. This requires however that the laws and justice is created out of empathic ideals as well, otherwise, empathic morality will end up in conflict with laws and justice.
You just weigh it, pros and cons of a decision. I personally wouldn’t break the law because I’d feel so bad of the consequences, the punishment of society, like society’s being mean to you, would be too much to bear.
What if there were laws that needed to be broken to expose a broken system? How does one live in a society that, for example, have totalitarian laws and keep empathic morality? Like the recent laws in China which can put people in prison for life just for speaking out against oppressive politics. Breaking that law would be considered fine by most people. But if you are raised in that society, you and others around you might view those laws and justice as the status quo. Therefore you accept that breaking a law that forbids something most other people in the world would consider a human right, would make you feel bad.
So how do you combine empathic morality with a justice system that doesn't equal to true empathic values and human rights? If breaking the law is a good thing, but makes you feel bad, how does that combine with your ability to value pros and cons of that choice?
I still wouldn’t try to change a law if it was wrong, I don’t have time to change the world it’s just not worth the time. I suppose I still have trust in my society, maybe if I lived somewhere where the laws were making my life miserable, maybe I’d try to get out of that country, even if illegally, because it would be worth it, by weighing the pros and cons. Otherwise if I broke the laws of that society and was punished maybe I wouldn’t feel bad. I would cry out at the injustice of the situation and I would feel better because I’m sure I wouldn’t be alone.
Perhaps they do. I like logic and critical thinking.
You arent answering the question, Im not sure why but you keep giving me Wishy washy non-sequators. Ill take the hint and leave you be.
But we can't create an empathic morality theory based on the status quo of one country. You also have to keep in mind that laws change all the time, nothing of that is static. If a government all of a sudden change laws into something that is not good for the people, that would need to be overthrown by the people. Otherwise, you are advocating for a totalitarian regime in which you would follow any leader who put into play any type of law.
You need a viewpoint on morality that is forming justice and laws, not that is coming out of it. That's the whole purpose of ethics; how we form society based on a set of philosophical moral guidelines.
To be very brief and general:
Socrates insisted on questioning those who claimed to be an authority on knowledge, which led to him being convicted of “corrupting the youth” and sentenced to death.
Diogenes lived as a voluntary beggar, and modeled his actions after dogs; shamelessly masturbating and defecating in public, believing that it was a more authentic lifestyle. He is also the founder of Cynicism.
Buddhism prescribes a way of life that reduces suffering by severing your attachment to desire, called The Middle Way. Buddhists adhere to The Middle Way in their daily lives.
Hedonism is the belief that we act in one of two ways; avoiding suffering or increasing pleasure. Typically they answer the question “What is the good life” by stating that it is the life that maximizes pleasure while reducing suffering. Both courses have been taken to their extremes, resulting in Asceticism and what is typically thought of with the word Hedonism; a person who considers seeking pleasure as the highest good.
Then the 'philosophy' you are referring to is not actually philosophy.
A more substantial takeaway is: whatever feels good to someone (in their entirety, not just here and now) is what is good to them, and so what is good objectively, without bias toward anyone in particular, is what feels good to everyone.
I believe logic and critical thinking fall under the purview of philosophy.
Very good! It seems like you have proven yourself correct.
Ok, so are critical thinking and logic of practical value?
Edited for clarity.
Ok, so that seems to contradict what you said in the above quote. Philosophy seems to have some practical value after all, and is useful in everyday life.
I think that there is a lot of philosophy that is sort of arcane and impractical like you say but there is a lot thats useful as well.
It depends on how you define philosophy, I think a case could be made that philosophy can be applied generically, outside academia as well as within. To me, its more about thinking, how to think and thoughtful consideration than strictly academia or philosophical history.
The more impractical aspects of philosophy are also interesting as thought exercise, which I would say is of practical value.
So you join a philosophy forum to test your ideas. Great, that makes sense. That means listening to other people - it's other people's criticisms, valid or not, that are the test for your ideas. But you say the virtue of your idea is that you don't have to listen to other people. That makes your idea immune from criticism. So by what means are you going to test your idea?
Of course you make your own decisions. Moral philosophers want to enable you to make your own decisions, not to prevent you from doing so. Only a religious command ethic tells you what to do without giving reasons (other than "because God says so"). But to make your own decisions you need grounds for deciding one way or another. Different moral theories provide different grounds for decision making - but whatever the ground, the decision you make upon it will be your decision, no one else's. The problem with your idea is that the only ground you have for making a decision is how you feel about the decision you've made. This doesn't explain how you arrived at your decision in the first place or why you feel the way you do about it. If it's only the feelings that count in the decision, then the decision is beyond the possibility of criticism or revision in the light of evidence or reason. You are just stuck with your feelings about things, which means you are being told what to do by feelings you have no control over, rather than making your own decisions based on reason and evidence. In other words, your idea is self-defeating.
Thanks for the input. Though I’m thinking after being on this forum, I am reminded that Philosophy asks questions that other subjects have done away with. And I can think/believe anything I want on these matters, including religion. Because nothing in Philosophy has been proven so there will be pros and cons on any view. Seems like a waste of time. Thanks all.
Before I’d be outside as a child, staring at a plant, thinking, ‘I can’t quite work this out’. I.e. life, existence, the Universe. I’m done now, the only chance I’d be wrong is if the Universe is infinite. But again, I am entitled to my opinion because nobody knows if the Universe is infinite or not.
So if ignoring the coronavirus and the need to wear a mask and practice distancing makes us feel good that is what we should do?
I think our religious heritage has lead us down the wrong path. It appears we have forgotten what philosophy has to do with science, and what science has to do with right reasoning.
At the bottom of that link is this quote:
Philosophy brings us to science and science brings to new truths and changed consciousness.
Yes not wear a mask etc. If it doesn’t break the law, most people feel bad doing this though.
How does Philosophy today lead us to science?
Only if we have no concept of the future nor whether we might feel good then.
Also would this mean that if Trump allowed all crimes within a 48 hour period that anything you do then is fine?
By elucidating what science is, to what extent its procedures are rational and how it's methods achieve knowledge, in contrast to other "methods" of trying to acquire knowledge (e.g. divine inspiration or the "authority" of religious texts, or Trump style evidence-free subjective conviction).
You are right, however, that feeling good has something to do with morality. Normally it is called happiness, and it is certainly right, and natural, for anyone to pursue happiness. But for a moral, virtuous person, the happiness of others should be included in one’s own feeling of happiness, and a morally conscious person would train himself to feel good when helping others feel good. The right thing to do is making yourself feel good while doing the right thing.
The law gives you very little indication of what the right thing may be since the laws may be bad. Sure, you can choose to believe that the laws of your country are generally not immoral, but it should be a requirement for any morally conscious person to critically assess the law before obeying it. If in the end you do accept most laws, it’s not because they are the laws but because your own moral standards have approved of them.
Morality are rules of social interactions for all members of the group and for all times.
I assume by "group" you mean the world.
So if we are talking about morally good behavior for the world we must talk about what's always good, so it can't be based on temporarily changing feelings and/or emotions.
The statement "The right thing to do is what makes us feel good [...]" is thus immoral.